Many types of handheld utility pliers are known in the art. Conventional pliers typically include two rigid plier members interconnected in a scissors-like arrangement allowing for a workpiece to be grasped by jaw portions of the pliers in response to movement of handle portions of the pliers. Over the years, numerous improvements have been made to the conventional plier design in order to obtain a better and more efficient plier. For example, self-adjusting pliers have been developed in order to provide a set of pliers that more easily adjust to the size of a given workpiece.
A basic feature of self-adjusting pliers, such as those disclosed in application Ser. No. 09/108,561, hereby incorporated by reference, is that they provide two rigid structures having respective handle portions and jaw portions, a rack engagement structure mounted on one of the rigid structures, and a rack provided on the other rigid structure.
In these types of pliers, however, when there is an absence of a workpiece between the jaw portions and manual force is applied to the handle portions toward one another, the jaw portions eventually engage one another and then frictionally rub against one another as the rack engagement structure moves toward the rack and until the rack engagement structure engages the rack. Because users may have a tendency to work the tool without a workpiece between the jaw portions (e.g., to test the tools prior to a clamping operation), the point of engagement between the jaw portions tends to be a primary area of wear. In addition, the relative movement between the contacting jaw portions may cause some misalignment between the jaw tips during some points of operating the tool, which may be undesirable from a cosmetic point of view.
In addition, the self-adjusting pliers in the aforementioned incorporated Application have handle members that are spring biased apart. Thus, when the tool is not being used, the handle members are spread wide apart. As a result, such pliers occupy a relatively large amount of space when being stored. Thus, there exists a need to provide self-adjusting pliers that can be efficiently secured in a compact configuration for storage purposes.